Ripples of Grace
Brrd Roots ~ Free Verse
Ripples of Grace
The brook—
It’s not just a stream.
It’s a hum.
A pulse.
A mirror.
Sometimes, I think it remembers—
Everything.
Wars bleeding into rivers,
Hope blooming and fading like smoke,
Despair clinging to stone—relentless.
Now, the storms roar,
The glaciers crumble,
And the brook’s tune sharpens.
Not loud, not screaming—
A whisper.
It pulls at my thoughts:
Will we listen this time?
Or—
Will we drown in the noise we’ve created?
---
Shadows and Seeds
In the garden, dirt sticks to my nails.
It feels grounding.
Safe.
My hands tug at weeds that snap free like they’ve been waiting to escape.
It feels like a win,
But we know better.
They’ll be back.
“Ever notice how pulling weeds feels like winning?” I ask Paul.
He leans against the fence, spinning a blade of grass like it holds all the answers.
“Every damn time,” he smirks.
“It’s like—Sisyphean.
Classy, huh?”
I look beyond the rows of kale, shimmering in the sun.
The brook hums faintly, its ripples catching the light like gold.
“Why do we keep building on broken ground?” I ask.
“Why don’t we ever stop to ask that?”
Paul sighs, brushing soil off his jeans.
“Maybe it’s easier to patch things up than admit how much they’ve cracked.”
The brook doesn’t respond—
Not with words—
But its hum feels louder now.
---
Miriam by the Brook
Miriam doesn’t say much,
But when she does, it sticks.
Like honey—
Quiet sweetness tangled in grit.
She’s standing knee-deep in the brook,
Arms full of seaweed,
Shoulders tense against the current.
The air smells sharp—damp stone and pine.
“We plant things, hoping they’ll grow,” she says.
“But shadows—they spread anyway.
Greed.
Droughts.
The mess we leave behind.
Sometimes it feels like the world doesn’t care about hope.”
I crouch by the bank.
“So, what do we do?”
Miriam turns.
The light filters through the trees, catching her face.
“You plant stronger things,” she says.
“Things the shadows can’t choke out.
And then—
You trust the light to find them.”
The brook ripples,
Its tune weaving her words into the wind.
---
Victor’s Recollections
Victor—
He lives in two worlds.
The polished, invulnerable surface
And the cracks that whisper when no one’s watching.
“Sometimes I think I’ve spent my life outrunning guilt,” he says.
“But guilt moves faster.
It always does.”
Miriam once told him—
“You lie to yourself like it’s a performance.
Not out loud—
But in the way you frame things to make them softer.”
Her words haunt him now.
Victor thinks of the people he’s hurt,
The hope that fell apart,
The questions he couldn’t answer.
The brook hums beside him,
But he doesn’t kneel.
Not yet.
---
Julian’s Spotlight and Shadows
Julian—
He was famous for being invisible.
Turning down interviews,
Dodging cameras.
People loved to hate him.
Or maybe, they just hated not understanding him.
Standing at the edge of the brook,
He looks smaller than the man the world imagines.
“They don’t see me,” he says.
“They see versions—
Things I can’t live up to.”
The brook ripples.
Soft.
Waiting.
---
Grace and Restraint
In Meadowbrook,
We talk about duty like it’s water—
It nourishes,
But it drowns you if it has no borders.
Paul jokes,
“Meadowbrook holds its breath for tradition.”
But Miriam shakes her head.
“Tradition isn’t the problem,” she says.
“It’s restraint without reflection.
Doing things because you think you have to,
Not because you’ve chosen to.”
I don’t tell them which one I agree with.
It feels like all our perspectives belong in the brook anyway—
Circling endlessly,
Clashing,
Merging.
---
Cycles of Redemption
At dawn,
I kneel by the brook,
Its water soaking into my jeans.
Pine needles scatter across the ground,
Their scent grounding me.
“I’ve spent my life looking for clarity,” I whisper.
“But maybe clarity isn’t what matters.
Maybe it’s the questions—
The way they push you to move.”
The brook hums softly.
And for the first time in a while,
I don’t feel lost.
---
When the Storm Comes
The storm strikes suddenly.
The brook rises,
Its rhythm breaking into chaos.
Harrison’s garden floods.
Miriam’s farm bends under the weight,
But it doesn’t snap.
Julian kneels by the brook’s edge,
His hands trembling.
This time,
He listens.
Not to the storm,
But to the quiet hum beneath it.
Grace feels distant—
And close.
---
Eternal Ripples
Meadowbrook isn’t perfect,
But it’s healing.
Miriam’s farm feeds families far beyond the town.
Victor’s notebook finally fills—
Not with answers,
But with questions that open instead of close.
And Julian?
He speaks less,
Listens more.
As for me,
I keep planting.
Kale.
Hope.
Grit.
I’ve stopped asking for perfection.
Planting feels like faith—
A kind you hold on to
Even when the shadows spread faster than light.
The brook’s rhythm continues.
It whispers through everything.
It doesn’t ask for much—
Just that we listen.
This is humanity.
And nature.
A laugh shared in the face of loss.
A bridge between despair and redemption.
A ripple of grace—
That never fades.
